U.S. soldiers patrol the Hariyah district in Baghdad, Iraq, Aug. 30, 2008. The soldiers are in the 101st Airborne Division's Company A, 1st Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Charles Gill U.S. Teams Weaken Insurgency In Iraq -- Washington Post
By the time he was captured last month, the man known among Iraqi insurgents as "the Tiger" had lost much of his bite. Abu Uthman, whose fierce attacks against U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians in Fallujah had earned him a top spot on Iraq's most-wanted list, had been reduced to shuttling between hideouts in a Baghdad slum, hiding by day for fear neighbors might recognize him.
In the end, a former associate-turned-informant showed local authorities the house where Uthman was sleeping. On Aug. 11, U.S. troops kicked in the door and handcuffed him. They quietly ended the career of a man Pentagon officials describe as the kidnapper of American journalist Jill Carroll and also as one of a dwindling number of veteran commanders of the Sunni insurgent group known as al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).
Uthman, whose given name is Salim Abdallah Ashur al-Shujayri, was one of the bigger fish to be landed recently in a novel anti-insurgent operation that plays out nightly in Baghdad and throughout much of Iraq. U.S. intelligence and defense officials credit the operation and its unusual tactics -- involving small, hybrid teams of special forces and intelligence officers -- with the capture of hundreds of suspected terrorists and their supporters in recent months.
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My Comment: You cannot run an insurgency if you do not have any safe houses or safe havens to run to. This is AQI's condition in Iraq, and it will soon be the case for shiite militia's like Sadr's Militia.
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